The carbon footprint of our gadgets, the internet and the systems supporting them account for about 3.7% of global greenhouse emissions, according to a widely publicized 2019 report by the carbon transition thinktank, the Shift Project. And this trend is rising rapidly. As a result, Ryte set out to measure the consumption of websites as accurately as possible in order to determine its impact on the environment. Assembling a team of data science experts, including Ryte Data Scientist, Katharina Meraner, who has a PhD in climate science and global warming, and input from external experts at Climate Partner, Ryte developed and launched the "Ryte Website Carbon KPI" within its Website User Experience Platform.

"There are currently 189,000,000 active websites. Our goal is to make 5% of all active websites, or 9.5 million websites, climate neutral by the end of 2023 with the help of our platform, strong partners, social media activities, and much more. Time is ticking and making websites carbon neutral is really easy compared to other industries and processes. So let’s go for it and all work towards this goal," said Andy Bruckschloegl, CEO of Ryte.

“Teaming up with Ryte will help raise awareness on how information technology contributes to climate change – while at the same time providing tools to make a difference. Ryte’s industry-leading carbon calculator enables thousands of website owners to understand their carbon footprint, to offset unavoidable carbon emissions and thus lay a basis for a comprehensive climate action strategy,” said Tristan A. Foerster, Co-CEO ClimatePartner.

How is the Ryte Website Carbon KPI calculated?

Using a proprietary algorithm developed by its team of data scientists and developers, Ryte leverages its website user experience platform to understand the multitude of variables that have a potential impact on websites’ performance. This includes analyzing the code of the entire website, average page size, as well as monthly traffic by channel. Ryte analyzes the effect of these factors on the entire website to produce a calculation of the amount of CO2 a given website emits: the ‘Ryte Website Carbon KPI’ metric.

“I am really happy and proud that we were able to build a KPI that is much closer to the consumption of the website than anything else on the market so far,” Katharina Meraner said, citing the result of the significant work over the past months.

With the ability to accurately calculate the carbon impact of websites, Ryte’s goal is to help clients understand what steps can be taken to reduce the amount of CO2 emissions their websites produce. For example, website owners can run their website on a green server as well as using code and on-site elements to build their website in a more resource-efficient way. In addition to helping the environment, there is a clear business case to optimizing websites to be more sustainable: improvements such as reducing webpage loading times and enhancing user experience are proven to have a positive business impact.

Nevertheless, although it is Ryte’s goal to work with clients to make the best possible changes to reduce emissions, websites still require servers and electricity — so carbon emissions can never fully be reduced to zero. Consequently, Ryte is collaborating with a reforestation project in San Jose, Nicaragua, to allow its customers to offset their remaining emissions through the purchase of climate certificates. Ryte shows clients the calculation of how much CO2 their website uses and what the equivalent monetary value is that they need to invest to attain carbon neutrality.

Once a website has achieved carbon neutrality on the Ryte platform, the website owner receives an official Ryte “Climate Neutral Website” badge to place on their site informing users of their pledge and commitment for helping to reduce carbon emissions and support the environment.

For more information, or to learn how you can start measuring your website’s CO2 impact, visit ryte.com/gocarbonneutral.